SUNRISE, Fla. — The Florida Panthers left the ice to a chorus of boos at the end of the first period Thursday. It was one of those periods when nothing could go right. Sergei Bobrovsky gave up four goals on 11 shots and got benched at the first intermission. The Panthers’ power play reverted back to its worst instincts and put just two shots on goal in four minutes. Florida even faced the tall task of staging a comeback without Aleksander Barkov, who did not play due to an illness.
Even for the “Comeback Cats,” it was too much. Although the Panthers cut the Dallas Stars’ lead down to one goal in the third period, the Stars hung on to beat Florida, 6-4, in Sunrise.
A disastrous first period was too much for the Panthers to overcome.
It started off well enough, especially considering Barkov’s absence.
Florida generated the first four shots of the game, hit the crossbar once and even got a prime scoring chance on the power play. It was, however, the only shot the Panthers generated on their first power play and Dallas got a 2-on-1 rush right after it ended, beating Bobrovsky to score on its first shot of the game.
The Stars then scored on their sixth shot and then their seventh, and then went up 4-0 when Tyler Seguin scored on a rebound with 8.3 seconds left in the first period. Boos chased the Panthers off the ice and then cheers greeted goaltender Spencer Knight when he replaced Bobrovsky.
It was a fresh start for Florida and, in the second period, it paid off. Left wing Carter Verhaeghe broke the ice for the Panthers with a power-play goal -- his team-leading 11th goal of the season -- and centers Eetu Luostarinen and Sam Reinhart both scored before the end of the period, trimming Dallas’ lead to 5-3 at the second intermission. Florida was well within striking distance after turning up the forecheck, going 2 for 2 on the power play and outshooting the Stars, 15-9, in the second.
This was where the comeback stalled. Despite 15 shots in the third period, the Panthers only once beat Jake Oettinger, who replaced Scott Wedgewood in the second period after the Stars’ other goaltender left with a lower-body injury, and Dallas clinched the game on an empty-net goal with 17.9 seconds remaining.
Knight stopped 17 of 18 shots in relief for Florida, as neither starting goalie finished the game.
All-Star right wing Matthew Tkachuk’s goal with 6:04 remaining gave the Panthers a prayer. A four-goal deficit was all the way down to 5-4 and Florida was putting together another dominant period, with double the shots on goal as Dallas, but Tkachuk got into a fight with 2:33 remaining and was stuck in the penalty box for the Panthers’ last push.
With a chance to pull off its third four-goal comeback in eight months, Florida fell just short.
